If you have a different accent to your children

[doadeer]

My son is a toddler so just starting to build words. I'm from NE but live in an area of London with a "neutral accent" - DH has more of a London accent (not neutral)

I say BOOK rather than BUCK, GRASS rather than GRARSE etc.

His nursery when he goes back has lots of different accents including nationalities and regional accents.

Just curious how your children's accents developed if you live somewhere different to where you grew up.

I definately say BOOWK hahaha! I should have written it like that

We all have different accents in our house
I’m from the south east, Dh is from the north east, both dc have lived in the north east but we now live in Lancashire
It’s never been an issue

It’s have just realised that I pretty much described my accent as beige Glaswegian/Scottish. That’s flattering. 😆

From London as are both parents but my paternal grandfather (who I never knew) was Welsh. As a result there’s some weird Welsh slang in my Dads vocabulary and a few works he says in a London accent but very Welsh (“caravan” is the one that immediately springs to mind).

From my experience growing up with several friends with foreign or non-local parents, the accent at school will determine 99.9% of their accent. That is where they spend most of their time and that is why children whose parents don’t even speak English can grow up with perfect fluent unaccented English. Children’s capacity to mimic language is astounding.

We live in the home counties; DH has a classic Home Counties accent (on the posher side!) and I'm from darkest Lancashire.

When little, up to maybe 6/7, my first dc said 'bath' with a flat 'a' like me, which I loved- a little part of the north had rubbed off! It has faded though to 'barth'. My second dc has no northern twang at all.

I moved to uni at 18 and never went back (came to London) so my accent has def softened off too. Strangely, the older I get, the more it creeps back in and I feel it's stronger again now than when I was 25 - I'm 44. Maybe it's me being more comfortable in my own skin, maybe it's missing the north, which I do. Who knows.

I love hearing twangs of different accents though- makes life more interesting, surely?!

There is a very big South African community where we are. The parents have retained strong SA accents even 20 years after leaving and mix in predominantly SA circles. The children all have the local accent, generic southern

I'm told regularly that I have "no" accent, but I think it's just difficult to place. When I worked in a call centre I was asked more than a handful of times whether I was based in the UK or not...which was odd.

DS sounds like me. When he was at nursery some Scottish/Glaswegian was detectable but that's gone now. I imagine it'll be back.

Oh, and I sound like neither of my parents, or my sibling.

@notalwaysalondoner One of my friends apparently speaks French with a really strong Marseille accent. He was taught by someone from Marseille all the way through school.

My French sounds a little bit Belgian apparently because I was mostly taught by a Belgian. I never knew until someone pointed it out. Mostly my French attempts just sound awful. But some words are really strongly accented apparently. It’s quite funny.

The other day my we were at the petrol station and this older, Scottish guy approaches my boyfriend and and asks "Is this alright for the moor?" And we were like "What moor?" But the guy was saying 'mower'. He was asking if the petrol was okay for his lawnmower.

DD has a very sweet mix of Scottish accent (where we live/ my accent) with lots of daddy Irishness thrown in. I don’t notice it too much other than she pronounces thumb as ‘tum’, says ‘come wit me’ etc, but other people comment on her Irish accent a lot!

@Lifeisbrutal

In Scottish pronunciation, "mower" and "more" are close to being homophones.

'Moor' rhymes with 'poor'. It's a totally different vowel sound.

I live in NE as do my children and grandchildren. We All live Within a mile and a half radius of each other.
We all have regional accents, some stronger than others, apart from my DDs totally home edded children , who speak a bit more posh than the rest of us. The youngest did use to speak with a bit of an American accent from watching too much Dora the explorer. Getting Nanarrr, constantly while driving her about was a bit wearing.
Thankfully she’s had it beaten out of her 😂

I have a 'soft' Irish accent and DH has a very Italian accent, our children have 'Oxford' accents which I gather is perfect English. They can all do a very good impression of mine and their dad's accent though - it's quite funny when they're taking the piss.

I have 2 sons both born in manchester as was i we now live in scotland (scottish husband) the one thay goes to school speaks scottish witj a bit of mancunion slang and the other sounds really man union. Dd was born in scotland in dec so god knows what she will speak like

Im scottish but dc have quite well spoken English accents. We live in Edinburgh. Dd1 was 4 when we moved here from abroad so hers might be slightly understandable (although it's been 6.5 years) but dd2 was only 10 months old and didn't speak til she was 3. She started nursery. It's quite odd

My DH has a rural/farmer accent. I can't really explain my accent, I'm a bit of a sponge so it reflects who I've been spending time with.

DD is too young to tell but has taken to calling me Mammy (thanks to my parents) but elongates it to match her Dad's family accent. So instead of Mam-my it's turned into Maaaam-my. It's very bizarre.

Should have said she started nursery at 2

If babies learn all/most of their language from their parents, how on earth do they end up with the neighbours’ accents?

Social pressure. The desire to fit in (whether conscious or not) is very powerful. We moved across the country when I was 9 and I very quickly learnt that my strong regional accent was absolute social suicide. I’ve ended up with a fairly polished RP as a result. DD has a regional twang which gets stronger throughout term time and then softens over the holidays.

Social pressure. The desire to fit in (whether conscious or not) is very powerful.

That doesn't explain my DC. I have a scottish accent, their peers for the most part have scottish accents, their grandparents who are very active in their lives have scottish accents as do their teachers. They do not.

It's not from a conscious desire to fit in. Children born in a different region from where their parents were brought up will have the accent of where they live because that's what they're surrounded by. From the minute they start going to childcare/playgroup/nursery, they'll naturally copy their peers. That's what socialisation is about. Speech is just a part of it.

My cousins in Australia retain their very broad Yorkshire accent. Their kids who were born there have never had a trace of Yorkshire in their voices.

@midnightstar66 you’re right, it doesn’t! How interesting. It will be fascinating to see if your DC adopt stronger accents as they go through school.

Social pressure. The desire to fit in (whether conscious or not) is very powerful.

Fascinating example of this from my colleague's family:

Both parents are German. Both have been living in Switzerland since before the kids. And both speak pretty pure Hochdeutsch (standard German) with little to no trace of a regional accent - basically the German version of BBC English before regional accents were regularly heard on TV.

All three children speak the same accent. At home with their parents, that is. Also when I hear them speak (i.e. when they're with their parents). Having been born and grown up here, they're also all perfectly fluent in the local dialect.

Here's where things get funny: Swiss schools teach in standard German. Dialect isn't really written (except maybe in texts). Standard German also frequently spoken at schools.

All three of colleague's children apparently have the thickest, most unintelligible Swiss accents when they speak standard German at school. According to colleage it's far thicker than Swiss colleagues of ours who naturally speak standard German with a Swiss accent.

Colleague thinks it's because they don't want to stand out. But: fascinating nonetheless.

I have a not very strong north west of England accent, DH has mild Scottish accent.
Kids all born in Aus, eldest has the most British sounding accent, middle has quite Aussie, youngest is very Aussie, even tho they’ve all lived all their lives here. I suppose younger two were exposed to more Aussie accents from a younger age, whereas eldest had a couple of years mainly hearing our voices.
They can all do super-Aussie accents when they want to but their attempts at English and Scottish accents are hilarious!!

I'm from NE England - dh and kids have always lived in Scotland.

Ds is my eldest and definitely has a tiny bit of my accent even though he's 13! Dd has a really really strong Scottish accent like dh.